


Never Meant to Happen

by Unfeathered



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Character Study, Heavy Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:54:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27514168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unfeathered/pseuds/Unfeathered
Summary: Some things happen however hard you try not to let them
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Comments: 10
Kudos: 27





	Never Meant to Happen

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to [Alexandria](/users/Alexandria/) for the wonderfully quick and helpful beta <3
> 
> I’ve never been a Jack/Ianto shipper. I came into Torchwood from Doctor Who, as a Jack/Doctor shipper, and I could never see what people saw in Ianto, nor what they thought Jack would see in him.
> 
> Then my role-play Jack met a wonderful role-play Ianto, and it finally began to make sense to me. And recently, when I started writing fic again, I decided to try and put some of that into words. This is what happened. It’s only taken me a decade or so to get there. :-D

He never meant for this to happen.

He didn’t sleep with his team. Well, all right, there _had_ been Brenda, who was hot and blonde and turned out to be one hell of a dominatrix. Okay, and Damian, who just needed someone to confide in and one thing led to another. And Charlie, who was young and cute and bright. And Laura, with the gorgeous lips and the playful eyes and the legs up to _here_ …

Okay, all right, he ended up sleeping with his team quite frequently. He didn’t have a lot of time to meet anyone else, and working together so intensely tended to foster feelings of closeness and understanding. But he _tried_ not to sleep with his team, especially once he became head of Torchwood Three and his team became his direct reports.

And he tried so hard not to sleep with Ianto. There was temptation right from the start, what with that demure, beautifully cut suit, taunting him with the promise of what might be concealed beneath, and that curly little smile, and that knowing, promising glint in his eyes. The seductive lilt of that soft Welsh voice. But he held on tight to his self-control, because he wasn't going to let it happen. He'd go out and fuck his way around half of Cardiff, but he wouldn't fuck his team.

No matter how hot they looked in a suit.

* * *

He never meant for this to happen.

It was supposed to be just a come-on, to seduce Jack into letting him into the Hub, the only chance he had to try and save Lisa. And then it was just supposed to be a little more flirting to keep Jack blissfully unaware and unsuspicious, focussed on how much fun he was instead of prying into what he was up to. He never meant to start _feeling_ things for the man. He never meant for the innuendos they exchanged to make him feel hot, never meant for those warm blue eyes to make him feel wanted, never meant for the open pain on Jack's face every time he lost someone to make him want to comfort him and bring back that gorgeous smile.

He absolutely never meant to fall for this man.

But fall he did, and that's why it hurt so much as time went on and Jack continued to be oblivious. Joking and flirting with him, yes, catching his eye when no-one else was looking, and chuckling warm and low, like sharing a private joke just with him. But still ignoring him most of the time, completely unaware of all the conflict and agony writhing around inside. Of course, Ianto kept all his baggage very well-hidden – he'd always been in control, only showing what he wanted to show – but it still stung that Jack couldn't see _any_ of it. Because somehow he felt that Jack ought to be able to see it, however hard he tried to hide it. Ought to be able to see his heart shrinking away to nothing with every day that Lisa slipped further away from him. Ought to be able to see that he was lying and cheating, endangering everyone by harbouring his cyber-girlfriend in the basement. Broken and flailing, desperate for someone to find out and stop him.

* * *

And then it happened. One day just going about his business and _bam!_ Ianto's hiding a cyber-girlfriend in the basement. _His_ basement, damn it. One of the monsters who wiped out Torchwood One, threatened to wipe out the whole world, who killed _Rose_ … _in his basement_.

How could he? How _could_ he? This man he'd trusted… helped… nurtured… and, okay, yes, flirted with, kindled a few sparks with, even if he'd never intended to let them be fanned into anything because – you know – he didn’t sleep with his team…

How _could_ he?

* * *

And then it happened. Jack found out, and stopped him. No, more than that. Didn’t just stop him; threw him down on his knees with a gun to his forehead and forced _him_ to stop it all. Finally _saw_ him, saw through him, all the lies and hateful deceit, and _saved_ him. Saved him from unleashing a monster on the world in the name of love. Brought him back from the edge, from becoming a monster himself, and in the aftermath, in the days that followed, gave him what he needed. Restrained him while he fought, held him while he cried, listened while he told the story, counselled him (not always wisely, but with all his heart) and cradled him while – finally, exhausted – he slept.

* * *

He never meant for this to happen. Never meant to start falling for Ianto. Never meant for the care and comfort he'd offer any of his team after something so traumatic to lead to anything more. He wasn’t even sure how it did become something more, how he let himself be teased across the line he'd drawn for himself so long ago. Something to do, he thinks, with the build-up of intimacy as he belatedly gave Ianto the time and attention he should have given him _before_ , let him talk, _listened_ to him talking, and found himself seeing something more than just a cute body in a suit and a quirky, appealing sense of humour. Seeing instead a quick, clever mind, resourcefulness he'd always known was there but never appreciated enough, and a soul blazing with more loyalty than he could ever have imagined.

Oh all right, _and_ a cute body in a suit.

And, it turned out, rather cute out of it as well.

* * *

He never meant for this to happen. He looked down at Jack, sleeping the sleep of the well-fucked, and still couldn’t make sense of how he felt. Sometimes he hated Jack, for making him give up on Lisa, even if he knew, deep down, she was past saving. Sometimes he loved Jack, for saving him instead and giving him something to live for, even if it was only some bleak, twisted version of happy ever after that wasn't exactly happy and certainly wouldn’t be forever after.

Not at Torchwood.

* * *

And then it happened. TARDIS engines in the Plass, and he didn't hesitate for a second. Left his team behind in a heartbeat for the Doctor, for the answers he’d been dreaming of for so long.

He got his answers, and so much more besides. The Doctor artificially aged and toyed with by a madman, mankind brought to its knees, Martha forced to walk the earth alone… the Master, crowing and triumphant… a year of agony and despair (a whole fucking _year_ ) – and then, just like that…

Reset.

A new chance. A chance to go back and do things right, do _better_ this time, because this time he knew what he wanted. He was going home. Now Cardiff wasn’t just somewhere to hang out and wait for his Doctor and his answers, because he'd had those now. It was somewhere he'd chosen to be, because it was _his_ , because he loved his team and they were his too.

* * *

And then it happened. Jack _died_ … and then he came back, and there was a wonderful kiss and the return of hope…

And then Jack disappeared without a warning, without a word, not even a fucking goodbye, and it was like the emptiness after Lisa all over again, like someone had yanked out his insides and left a great gaping hole because what was there to live for now?

He went to work and he ribbed his teammates as he'd always done and he stayed late to tidy up because what was there to go home to?

If Jack ever came back, he wasn’t going to let this slip through his fingers again. He was going to go for what he wanted, damn it. And he wanted all of it. Dates, dinners, nights where they actually stayed with each other till dawn, instead of one of them always sneaking off so no-one would find them together…

He wanted _Jack._ All of him. Properly.

* * *

He never meant for this to happen. Never meant to let it turn into a _relationship_ , of all things. He didn’t do relationships, not any more. He _loved_ people dearly, deeply, with all his heart. And he fucked people, hot and hard and intimate, gave them his all and lost himself in them, for a while.

But he rarely mixed the two. He learned not to do that after the Doctor, after Estelle, after Lucia. There were only so many times a man could stand to have his heart broken.

And yet there he was, on a date with Ianto Jones, laughing and smiling and feeling more love than he’d thought he had left in him.

* * *

He never meant for this to happen. Never meant to start having hope again for the future. Hope of a normal life – well, as normal as it got when you saved the world from aliens for a living. A _happy_ life, loving someone who kind of, sort of, in-his-own-way, loved him back. Or at least he hoped might do some day. Working more and more closely with him, finding support for their relationship from the rest of his team instead of the expected judgement, coming out of his shell more every day, feeling himself blossom and bloom, gaining confidence in who he was.

Losing two-fifths of the team in one dreadful blow, but the loss bringing the three of them who were left even closer together. Starting, tentatively, to feel hope for the future…

* * *

And then it happened. Bomb in his belly and a frantic, hurried goodbye. Agony worse than anything the Master had ever done to him as his body regrew from just an arm and a head. Spluttering and struggling as concrete poured down on him, alone. Coming round in a quarry to the discovery that it was Ianto's ingenuity and desperate resourcefulness that had saved him. Donning the replacement coat, meaning so much more because it was Ianto who’d found it for him.

Getting cock-blocked by Rhys because the damn beans were ready.

Trying, at Ianto's insistence, to be more open with him – with them all; trying to include Ianto and take his suggestions on board.

Letting Ianto come with him to Thames House to face down the 456.

* * *

And then it happened. Four days that felt like a lifetime, with more ups and downs and twists and turns than he could count. Losing Jack, rescuing Jack, finding Jack a new coat, getting cock-blocked by the damn beans, finding finally some hope again because at last Jack was talking to him, listening to him, letting him _in_.

Letting Ianto go _with_ him to face down the 456.

* * *

He never meant for any of this to happen. 


End file.
